The invention relates generally to the cleaning of multi-wire heads of the type used in non-impact printing systems such as electroresistive printers and more particularly to a novel arrangement in which a head and brush are moved relative to each other in such a way as to provide effective removal of debris collected by the head wires during the writing operation.
Non-impact printers, particularly of the electroresistive type, are widely used in high speed printing systems particularly those associated with computers. In an electroresistive printing system the writing medium is typically a special paper which has a thin aluminum film which is engaged by the multi-wire printing head. Electric current is passed selectively through the printhead wires in order to burn off areas of the aluminum coating to produce the desired writing. By the time a multi-wire printhead has traversed the width of the aluminized writing surface it typically has collected debris which must be removed in order to preserve clear writing in the subsequent line. Various brush arrangements and the like have been employed in the prior art in order to clean the head of collected debris, however, it has been found that the straightforward passage of a writing head over a brush is not sufficient to adequately clean multi-wire heads.